one cannot argue seriously for the impossibility of the conditions of an argument being meaningful — plaque flag

Haven't you said this from your own perspective?

That the boulder truly does not have a shape is supported by Einsteinian relativity, as shape is dependent on the frame of reference. — Metaphysician Undercover

You are mistaking the appearance of shape from different reference frames with each other.

It is similar to saying a pencil isn't straight because when dropped into a glass of water the pencil appears bent.

You are mistaking the appearance of shape from different reference frames with each other.

It is similar to saying a pencil isn't straight because when dropped into a glass of water the pencil appears bent. — wonderer1

No it is not "appearance" only. That is the whole point of relativity theory, it is what is really the case if e adhere to relativity theory. Just like the simultaneity of two events is actually different depending on frame of reference, and the passage of time is actually different (time dilation) depending on the frame of reference, the shape of the object is actually different (length contraction) depending on the frame of reference. When it is the case that from two distinct frames of reference, the shape of the object is different, we cannot say that one is the real, or true shape. That is the whole point of relativity theory in general.

Each of these two concepts serves to account for the temporal continuity of sameness of objects, in its own way, with its own history, but in reality each is just a different place holder for the unknown; each having its own connotations and extensions. — Metaphysician Undercover

To further understand this difference, it manifests as the difference between transcendent and immanent in the understanding of divinity, as well as the difference between local and non-local in quantum mechanics.

Simply put, the difference is in the way that we understand temporal continuity in relation to spatial existence. If temporal continuity is proper, and unique to each point in space, then each point has its own inherent maintenance as immanence, but if temporal continuity is universal, and the temporal continuity of all points everywhere, is related, this is transcendence.

Haven't you said this from your own perspective? — Angelo Cannata

Yes. But, respectfully, so what ? What do you expect ? A voice from the whirlwind ? But even that'd just be God's perspective, no ?

[1] Belief is the conceptual 'dimension' of the-world-from-a-perspective.

[2] This claim is itself a belief : in other words, the structure of our world as I see it.

[3] You may see the world differently, but the right string of words from me might change the way you see this same world.

If I give testimony, then it's indeed me giving testimony. I'll leave it for a certain stripe of mystic to believe in some naked reality, some grasp of Truth that is more than relatively settled belief. We can always change our minds, on some issues more plausibly than others. As I see it, you are maybe floating the usual bubble theory, paradoxically asserting that our world can't be talked about. The true sceptic is a madman or reduced to silence. Those who bring insight or even criticism take the shared world, shared language, and shared rational norms for granted (this equiprimordial pseudo-trinity is really one.)

I don't pretend to infallibility, and I hold to my right to change my mind in the future. As I see it, we tend to discuss our shared world from our differing perspectives. By doing so, we synthesize what we tend to call more adequate or 'objective' perspectives. I'm a big fan of Popper and his talk of letting our theories do our dying for us. His 'basic statements 'are also useful here. The tower of science rises from a swamp. No statement is beyond falsification or revision, but we take some as sure enough for now.

The newbie calculus student sees the same real numbers as the Fields Medal analyst, but not at all with the same depth or adequacy. They intend the same worldly object, the real number system (a cultural object), just as the child and the neurosurgeon can intend the same brain. Note that if inquiry is the settling of belief, which involves the resolution of a tension, it's no surprise that we understand our newly settled state as an improvement (as us moving closer to the 'truth.') But there's nothing magical in this word 'truth.' I call beliefs I share 'true.' In other words, I call descriptions of the world as I see it 'true.'

No it is not "appearance" only. — Metaphysician Undercover

Have you ever done the math?

https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/691825/will-you-see-distance-contraction-inside-the-space-ship-at-near-light-speed

I don't agree with 'indirect realism' because it posits two separate things - the reality and its representation. As if we could compare them. — Wayfarer

Might I rest assured you’re familiar with the so-called “dual aspect’ vs “dual object” theory, regarding transcendental philosophy, or theories of perception in general? If you are, and hold with the dual object scenario, which seems to be the case, re: “…posits two separate things…”, then your objection to indirect realism may be valid. But for he who holds with the dual aspect scenario, in which there are not two separate things, but merely two methods for examining the one thing**, the objection can be overruled.

So saying, transcendental theory, as epistemologically grounded as it is, makes explicit there are not two separate things, the real and the representation of the real, a seemingly ontological consideration to be sure, insofar as the representation is not a thing in the same sense as the thing which appears, is. This denominates representation to a speculative procedural constituent, logically concluded or rationally presupposed, rather than empirically given. It also makes the determination as to necessity vs contingency a mitigating condition in itself, the logic being necessary, the empirical, contingent.

And, while I agree we do not compare them, per se, the real against the representation, there are judgements which follow in due course. It is the judgements on the synthesis of representations, or, which is the same thing, our cognitions, that are compared, and those by reason for their mutual consistency, and to which Nature informs of the correctness, either of the one in particular, or of the one over the other in a series.

(** two methods: thought, and experience)

Is there another reason you do not agree with indirect realism? Or is it simply that I’m misconstruing what you meant by it?

transcendental theory, as epistemologically grounded as it is, makes explicit there are not two separate things, the real and the representation of the real, a seemingly ontological consideration to be sure, insofar as the representation is not a thing in the same sense as the thing which appears, is — Mww

Kant touch this.

:cool:

I would point with ↪Wayfarer to Descartes, as I think that distinction is what underlies the "objective domain" cited by the OP.

Right, and this definition of objective is what I most took issue with in my original response. I think it's lumping multiple ideas together that are better separated.

So when <talking about> the mind knowing mind-independent reality as it is in itself, 'mind-independent reality' designates things like boulders, trees, mountains, walls, paint, etc. It doesn't really matter if the distinction is artificial, so long as an appreciable number of designata are understood by the term, and able to be spoken about. I don't see that the thread has foundered on this distinction in any way. It seems like everyone knows what is being spoken about. To be precise, though, the most obvious and most primary complement would be private, mind-generated realities, such as thoughts, opinions, Descartes' recognition that he is a thinking thing, etc.

It seems fine as a pragmatic distinction to me as well. Like I said, I think such a distinction is fairly widely recognized. What I was asking was: is there a definition of mind independence that goes beyond merely a rejection of subjective idealism-- i.e. a definition that can challenge objective idealism --- while remaining monist, coherent, and consistent?

Personally, I'm not aware of such a definition that avoids falling into dualism. But if there isn't such a definition, then it's unclear to me exactly what objective idealists are arguing against or what their critics are arguing for.

As you point out, in obvious ways, some entities seem mind independent (rocks versus the mental image of a rock). In other obvious ways, nothing we know is mind independent (trivially true). In general, neither objective idealism nor its physicalist converse challenge these intuitive distinctions, which leads me to question what sort of definition would put what is at stake into clear terms? "Objectivity" here is, IMO, a red herring, neither here nor there, since it is best defined in terms of perspective and subjectivity.

Plus, the obvious cases bleed into less obvious ones. Is the United States of America mind-independent? Communism? Species? Color? It seems fairly obvious that these can all be described objectively to some degree. For example, there is an objective fact about the color of stop lights. But color being "mind independent" seems to spark more debate.

See below for more detail on why I think such a definition of mind-independence will be hard to come up with.



That's certainly an important part of the history. But the problem seems to have accelerated first with Kant's notion of the noumena and again with positivist attempts to argue that "objectivity becomes equivalent to truth at the limit." This is then combined with the larger issue of "objectivity" becoming conflated with "noumenal," "mind-independent," or "real."

Per you're earlier response:

I take the term 'objective' at face value, that is, 'inherent in the object'.

This seems to be a definition of objectivity that requires too many metaphysical assumptions for me. That it might be popular just suggests to me that the definition is part of the problem. It seems to me that it requires:

1. That objects are ontologically more fundamental than properties. I.e., that objects are not defined by their properties. If objects were defined by their properties, we'd have to explain on what grounds we can eliminate objects' properties vis-á-vis mind from consideration when it comes to "defining" an object. This is the case if we want to achieve a conception of "mind independence," anyhow. If objects are defined by their properties, then mind independent objects and those interacting with mind would be different objects, a sort of Kantian dualism of the sort Kant made efforts to avoid (arguably unsuccessfully).

2. It seems to require that objects hold the properties they do intrinsically. If objects have the properties they do in virtue of interactions with other objects, then any conception of "mind-independence" would need to explain how interactions with mind are not the type of extrinsic relations/properties that come to define an object. Same problems as #1 re dualism.

3. It seems to require a substance metaphysics since objects need to be more fundamental than their attributes. Objects must be somehow "contained" from the rest of the world, such that we have objects, plural, and not a single object.

I think there are ways around #1 and #2. Metaphysics has the idea of "bare substratum," pure haecceities or "objectness" that properties can attach to. But even advocates of substratum have approached it with reticence, and the need for such a view, to my mind, is simply evidence against objects being ontologically basic in the first place.

Of course, you could take most of the above as simply a good argument against any strong mind-independence, which you seem to be arguing for. That's fair. But there does seem to be an intuitive way in which external objects are mind-independent and I'd like to find a way to define that relation too. Further, if "objectivity" gets thrown into this issue, I feel like it puts us in the less defensible position of having to attack the "objectivity of the world," rather than simply arguing that objectivity is not what is at stake when defining "mind-independence."

If we instead define objectivity in terms of views being more or less objective/subjective, not loading the term up with ontological implications, it seems like we can separate the desire to speak of an achievable "objective view of the world," from whole issue of Kantian-style dualism.

I suspect….I’d like to think…..the extent to which you have a problem with indirect realism, isn’t so great.

For sure. My reticence re indirect realism doesn't equate to support for most formulations of direct realism. It's more a dissatisfaction with current theories of perception. Not that I have a good alternative; it's always easier to critique.

I do, however, tend towards the "direct," in some key ways. Hegel's intuition that, when we come to think differently about something, we change that thing, seems apt to me. The most obvious cases are those involving institutions. As history progresses, we come to view entities differently. "Communism," today doesn't mean what "communism" meant in 1848 when the Manifesto was published. The entity has changed with our conception of it. The very fact of our coming to see the entity in different ways changes the entity. The same is true with "chivalry," "Christianity," "the Second Amendment," etc.

But those entities can obviously also be described objectively in many ways. Hegel's insight is that this sort of change also applies to seemingly more "concrete," entities as well. When we discover more about water, lead, foxes, bacteria, etc. their relations with the world also change because our conception of them is one such relation. Thus, if objects are described relationally, then they change as the history of consciousness unfolds. And in this sense, the relation between perception / thought and entities seems quite direct.

If we say that only our "representations" of entities change throughout cognitive history, I fear we end up in dualism. How does this apply to things like "economic recessions?" Obviously, our representation is part of what that sort of entity is. But then recessions also have global causal powers; they enact a lot of physical effects for mere "representation," effects that can be objectively studied. A hard line between mental objects that change as conceptions of them change and objects-in-themselves who only have their representations changed seems doomed to end up very blurry. Thus, I find it better to talk about concreteness, and just accept that any "representation" is itself a direct relation between mind and the object being represented.

So saying, transcendental theory, as epistemologically grounded as it is, makes explicit there are not two separate things, the real and the representation of the real, a seemingly ontological consideration to be sure, insofar as the representation is not a thing in the same sense as the thing which appears, is. This denominates representation to a speculative procedural constituent, logically concluded or rationally presupposed, rather than empirically given. It also makes the determination as to necessity vs contingency a mitigating condition in itself, the logic being necessary, the empirical, contingent.

And this is, IMO, the presupposition that is the weak link. I don't agree with everything Hegel says about Kant, but I do agree with the position that the presupposition that perceptions are of objects in Kant is the stumbling block therein. This is given dogmatically, and I tend to agree with Hegel that it can't be taken for granted since it essentially begs the question on the issue of representation vis-a-vis reality. The point isn't that thoughts/perceptions cannot be of objects; it's that we can't start with that as a given. Recovering the objects of sensation without assuming them resolves the dualism (if you buy the story Hegel is selling anyhow).

Steady on, old chap. 'Buddha' means 'one who knows'. — Wayfarer

So does "gnomon". :joke:

A gnomon (/ˈnoʊˌmɒn, -mən/; from Ancient Greek γνώμων (gnṓmōn) 'one that knows or examines')

Perspective seems to correspond to the form of the rock; the rock has a form, and that gives rise to any subject necessarily having a particular perspective on the rock. Whereas the 'affect' of an organism is the internally generated sense of its own being. The yeast cell defines itself and delimits itself as sugar in, CO2 or Alcohol out.

A subject locates itself as an entity, and its perspective arises from its location. But such a definition of self is necessarily permeable and incomplete. It's affect is its response to its environment as well as its response to itself. ( — unenlightened

The enactivists look at subject-object, organism-environment this way:
The organism interprets its world, but not by representing it, not by attempting to match an internal model with an external reality. Instead, perception is grounded in sensory-motor interactions with the world. We know by doing, not by representing. Organisms know their world by building a niche out of it and interacting with this niche. Whatever aspects of that world are irrelevant to the goals and purposes that are defined by organism-niche interaction are invisible to that creature. So all living systems, through their activity within their niche, continually define their world via what matters, is significant and relevant to their continued functioning. The organism ceases to be an organism as soon as it loses this goal-oriented integrity and unity of functioning. Affect in its most basic form is simply this normative, goal-oriented organizational a priori. To perceive a rock as an object with properties such as weight, size and shape is to first construct such idealizations as identically persisting object number, magnitude, extension and measure. In other words, mathematics, logic and empirical science are human-created environmental niches that guide the way we interact with our world. They are affective value systems, through which we normatively determine correctness or incorrectness, truth and falsity in relation to all the features of rocks and other value objects experienced from within our constructed niche.

(Long time no see and sorry I'm late to this, I've just followed an impulse to rejoin the forum)

I would be a strong supporter of something like this theory if it were about a process. 'Minding', perhaps.

I know academe studies 'philosophy of mind' but 'mind' is a very English-language concept. Even our neighbours' French and German struggle to translate 'mind'. It's a thing that isn't a thing, an all-encompassing entity that yet has no 'stuff' in it. To me it feels to be in the way, like a homunculus.

Maybe 'minding' isn't right either but (a) it's a process, and I feel that much of what you write about is about process; (b) it relates to 'thinking' without imprisoning that thinking in a particular pseudo-place, allowing the body as well as the brain to get a look-in, indeed perhaps allowing the process to be free-floating in a Hegelian way as plaque flag references; (c) it's got an element of attention or caring in it, 'Yes I do mind', a touch of Heidegger's 'sorge' if we're prepared to mention the old Nazi - and for me that helps, we're talking about creatures who go about the world and aren't necessarily sitting back in their armchairs, puffing on their pipes, reflecting on great Matters, they are rather coping in the here and now with what matters to them, inventing ideas to explain what happens as they move around, improvising, improving, bouncing ideas off each other.

On this account of course there is no 'real' to penetrate to or to accept is forever out of reach, because there need be no ontology, like Collingwood's metaphysics. Epistemology might be all there is :)

The enactivists look at subject-object, organism-environment this way:
The organism interprets its world — Joshs

All very interesting, but I am more interested in how the boundary is formed; the 'dash' between organism and environment. You say, "the organism interprets..." and one assumes therefrom that the environment does not interpret. So there is an action before the act of interpretation, which is the act of self identification, that has to happen for there to be a separate world to interpret.

t I am more interested in how the boundary is formed; the 'dash' between organism and environment. You say, "the organism interprets..." and one assumes therefrom that the environment does not interpret. So there is an action before the act of interpretation, which is the act of self identification, that has to happen for there to be a separate world to interpret. — unenlightened

Most of our living is social, and our cultural environment is reciprocally interpretive. In the agential realism of Karen Barad and Joseph Rouse the non-human environment also interprets. Not everything for them has to lead back to a perceiving subject. They are perfectly happy to imagine a world without humans or animals in which each aspect of it interacts with other aspects in an agential way. That is, material interaction always takes place within configurations of mutual affecting that lend to all phenomena an intrinsically interpretive character.

Concerning the idea of organismic self-identification, on the one hand, one would have to say that the ‘self’ of the organism is not something locked within the borders of the physical body or brain, but is instead the ongoing and continually changing patterns of activity produced by brain-body-world reciprocal interaction. On the other hand, the organism part of this body-world interaction is characterized by a certain operational closure or asymmetry with respect to the world. Merleau-Ponty describes this ‘boundary’ as a ‘flesh’ of the world or chiasm, a kind of reciprocal exchange. One would have to imagine a self which continually comes to itself from the world, reinventing itself through this exposure and yet maintaining a certain integrity or style of being through these changes.

:cheer:

My reticence re indirect realism (is) more a dissatisfaction with current theories of perception. — Count Timothy von Icarus

D’accord. The analytic dudes got ahold of it, sent it off into the metaphysical puckerbrush.

I do, however, tend towards the "direct," in some key ways. — Count Timothy von Icarus

As do I, re: perception. Every perception is directly real, from which follows every sensation given from any one of them, is directly real.

I fear we end up in dualism. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Ehhhhh…I’m a staunch, dyed-in-the-wool, card-carryin’ dualist, so my position is we can’t really end up where we always were to begin with.

…..doomed to end up very blurry. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Yeah, but that’s a qualitative judgement describing a subject that holds those representations. Just as the representations change in correspondence to the conception of the entity, usually via experience, so too will the subject’s judgement change in correspondence to his representations. Blurry may then, if not become clear, then at least become different, in which case, what was formally i.e., a recession, becomes merely (a-HEM) a historically precedented temporary downward trend.

But I get your point.

Is there another reason you do not agree with indirect realism? Or is it simply that I’m misconstruing what you meant by it? — Mww

No, that's a pretty good analysis. Bernardo Kastrup will say that 'tears' are the 'external appearance' of sadness, but that they are not, in themselves, the actual feeling of sadness. They are how my sadness appears to another, whereas I experience it first person. I suppose that is dual-aspect monism isn't it?

The analytic dudes got ahold of it, sent it off into the metaphysical puckerbrush. — Mww

:lol:

Maybe 'minding' isn't right either but (a) it's a process, and I feel that much of what you write about is about process; (b) it relates to 'thinking' without imprisoning that thinking in a particular pseudo-place, allowing the body as well as the brain to get a look-in, indeed perhaps allowing the process to be free-floating in a Hegelian way as plaque flag references; (c) it's got an element of attention or caring in it, 'Yes I do mind', a touch of Heidegger's 'sorge' if we're prepared to mention the old Nazi - and for me that helps, we're talking about creatures who go about the world and aren't necessarily sitting back in their armchairs, puffing on their pipes, reflecting on great Matters, they are rather coping in the here and now with what matters to them, inventing ideas to explain what happens as they move around, improvising, improving, bouncing ideas off each other. — mcdoodle

Nice to see you back, and well said! :clap:

So Berkeley demonstrates that "matter" as a concept of something which exists independently of human minds is no more justified, nor even better than the concept of "the Mind of God". — Metaphysician Undercover

In passing it is worth noting that the current understanding of matter is represented by 'the standard model of particle physics.' And where do models exist, if not in minds? Hence, Richard Conn Henry's The Mental Universe and Bernard D'Espagnat, What we call Reality is Just a State of Mind.

if there isn't such a definition, then it's unclear to me exactly what objective idealists are arguing against or what their critics are arguing for. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Do you have any representatives of objective idealism in mind? Perhaps this snippet from the Wikipedia entry might provide grist for the mill:

Objective idealism starts with Plato’s theory of forms, which mantains that objectively existing but non-material "ideas" give form to reality, thus shaping its basic building blocks.

....

The philosopher Charles Sanders Peirce defined his own version of objective idealism as follows:

The one intelligible theory of the universe is that of objective idealism, that matter is effete mind, inveterate habits becoming physical laws (Peirce, CP 6.25).

By "objective idealism", Peirce meant that material objects such as organisms have evolved out of mind, that is, out of feelings ("such as pain, blue, cheerfulness") that are immediately present to consciousness.[8] Contrary to Hegel, who identified mind with conceptual thinking or reason, Peirce identified it with feeling, and he claimed that at the origins of the world there was "a chaos of unpersonalized feelings", i.e., feelings that were not located in any individual subject.[8] Therefore, in the 1890s Peirce's philosophy referred to itself as objective idealism because it held that the mind comes first and the world is essentially mind (idealism) and the mind is independent of individuals (objectivism) — Wikipedia

Peirce's vision is congenial to my way of thought. What you see with the appearance of the first organisms is also the appearance of subjective awareness albeit in rudimentary form.

I take the term 'objective' at face value, that is, 'inherent in the object'.

This seems to be a definition of objectivity that requires too many metaphysical assumptions for me. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I acknowledge that mine was an idiosyncratic definition, that 'inherent in the object' is not, in fact, the definition of 'objectivity'. But I still maintain that there are more and less objective ways of understanding. I referred above to the efficacy of the scientifically-developed COVID vaccines opposed to quack cures like hydrochloroquine - the scientifically-developed medicines are objectively more effective. I don't see how that can be disputed.

The philosophical issue I see with 'mind-independence' is this: Natural science might be perfectly justified in attempting to attain the hypothetical 'view from nowhere', that is, an understanding free of subjective, cultural, personal and other forms of bias. That is what I would designate 'methodological naturalism'. However, to make of that a metaphysical axiom - that science really sees 'the world' as it is and would be in the absence of any observer - is another matter entirely. In doing this, empiricism attempts to assign an absolute value to the objects of perception which are necessarily contingent. So trying to assign 'mind-independence' to the sensory domain is a performative contradiction, as any perception of it is necessarily contingent upon the senses and intellect (per Kant).

It's worth recalling that, in the classical tradition, objects of perception were regarded as being near to non-existent - they are ephemeral fleeting instances of the Forms. According to Afikan Spir, neoKantian philosopher, 'the empirical world has an illusory character, because phenomena are ever-changing, and empirical reality is unknowable.' Which, again, seems to find plenty of justification in the current state of physics!

Therefore, in the 1890s Peirce's philosophy referred to itself as objective idealism because it held that the mind comes first and the world is essentially mind (idealism) and the mind is independent of individuals (objectivism) — Wikipedia

That notion seems to go beyond your notion of a local Mind-Created World, to an ideal Mind that is literally out-of-this-world. Does Peirce define his postulated "The Mind" in more detail? How does "The Mind" compare to your creative "minds"? :smile:

My approach is more influenced by Buddhist Studies in not positing unknowable entities, such as 'ideal minds' and assigning roles to them. That said, Peirce's intuition that the Universe itself is 'mind-like' - that our minds mirror its workings in some fundamental way - is persuasive to me. Peirce supported a modified form of scholastic realism concerning universals.

As we look down on that city in the valley, it exists only as the-valley-for, never from no perspective at all. — plaque flag

You are appealing to a narrow concept of existence here.

You are appealing to a narrow concept of existence here. — Janus

How so ?

To be sure, I'm using a fairly concrete analogy there (taken from L) , but I embrace the existence of all kinds of mental entities, mathematical entities, etc. Truly I think I have an especially inclusive sense of existence, limited only by possible experience -- hardly a stringent criterion for someone who tries to speak as a philosopher.

Have you ever done the math? — wonderer1

You haven't provided an argument. The fact is that depending on the frame of reference, measurement of the same thing will be different, and not any one of the measurements can be said to be the objectively real or true measurement That a frame of reference can be produced which represents the object as "at rest", and this frame is said to provide the object's "proper length" is irrelevant, because that designation is completely arbitrary. By the precepts of relativity theory no object is truly, or really at rest, so "proper length" makes no assumption about a true or real length of the object.

Have you ever done the math?
— wonderer1

You haven't provided an argument. — Metaphysician Undercover

And you haven't answered the question.

It's not called relativity for nothing. Yet it isn't hard to determine that a lot of thing are at rest with respect to my initertial reference frame and I can discuss the shape of many such things as they are in my inertial reference frame. If I, for some reason, need to calculate how they might look from a different inertial reference frame I could do so. It's not a big deal.

Anyway, why would I bother providing an argument to someone who wants to argue about something he doesn't understand? I don't see the point in doing so.

It's not called relativity for nothing. Yet it isn't hard to determine that a lot of thing are at rest with respect to my initertial reference frame and I can discuss the shape of many such things as they are in my inertial reference frame. If I, for some reason, need to calculate how they might look from a different inertial reference frame I could do so. It's not a big deal. — wonderer1

But the question is whether those things have a real or true shape, independent from a frame of reference. That you can provide a measurement, and a representation of the shape of many objects, from a specific frame of reference indicates nothing about whether they have a shape independent from a frame of reference.

Anyway, why would I bother providing an argument to someone who wants to argue about something he doesn't understand? I don't see the point in doing so. — wonderer1

Well, it seems like you took objection to something I said, not vise versa. So if you cannot provide an argument to support your objection, then please be still. But I really wish you would provide such an argument, so I could find out why you think as you do, concerning this matter.

Well, it seems like you took objection to something I said, not vise versa. So if you cannot provide an argument to support your objection, then please be still. But I really wish you would provide such an argument, so I could find out why you think as you do, concerning this matter. — Metaphysician Undercover

But you won't find out why I think as I do, until you study special relativity well enough to know what you are talking about. So get back to me if that happens.

I meant you are stipulating that the sense of the term "existence" should be restricted to "exists for us".

But 'exists' means 'to have an identity' - to be this, as distinct from that. And I can't see how you can have that, without an observer. I mean, if you make any claim about existence, the first question is 'what do you mean by that?' And it's game over at that point. Again:

A fact does not hold in the universe if it has not been explicitly formulated. That should be obvious, because a fact is specific. In other words, statements-of-fact are produced by living observers, and thereby come into existence as a result of being constructed. It is only after they have been constructed (in words or symbols) that facts come to exist. Commonsense wisdom holds the opposite view: It holds that facts exist in the universe regardless of whether anyone notices them, and irrespective of whether they have been articulated in words.

This echoes the measurement issue in quantum mechanics - it's not until you make a measurement, or specify an outcome, that the object of analysis comes into existence. That is the thing that realists can't handle, so they invented the many-worlds interpretation just to avoid it.

On this account of course there is no 'real' to penetrate to or to accept is forever out of reach, because there need be no ontology, like Collingwood's metaphysics. Epistemology might be all there is :) — mcdoodle

:cool: :up:

I meant you are stipulating that the sense of the term "existence" should be restricted to "exists for us". — Janus

I claim that we can only talk sensibly about something at least possibly experienceable by us. I'm saying connected to our experience, not fully and finally or even mostly given, for even everyday objects are 'transcendent' in the Husserlian sense: they suggest an infinity of possible adumbrations. Note that I think a person can be alone with an experience --- be the only person who sees or knows an entity.